Masterpiece
by striped-jaguar
Summary: Dean didn't think himself an artist. Of course not. He just drew, and that's all there was to it. Very short and simple, something to read if you're in one of those "agh, today is stupid" moods.


Notes: I'm horribly biased, can you tell? About Harry, I mean. I also have no idea what a rastomarfin is, much less what it's like under the ear of one. The second and third sections are not really very relevant, but once I put them in, it felt silly taking them out. I wrote this is less than an hour, on a whim, so depth is lacking and coherency is questionable.

Enjoy!

Disclaimer: Hmm. I'm lazy and bitter, leave me alone.

Masterpiece

When he was little, he never really believed it when his grandmother and mother and father, all very truthful, told him that he had a gift. Sure, he could draw and paint and stuff, but that was only moving your fingers and wrist and using your eyes, and most everyone could do that, right? The canvas or paper and ink and colour was already provided for you, so you can't really take credit for _that_. He just arranged the medium onto something blank, he filled it up without thinking too much how he was going about doing it, and when he got tired of that particular piece, he would proclaim it finished and his teachers would coo over it. His friends all complimented it, and he would feel proud, but not special - because he'd see other's work, where they put so much more effort and thought and emotion into it than he did, and he appreciated their art so much more, though they never believed him when he said so.

Dean, you're too modest, they'd say.

But Dean didn't think himself an artist, because he hadn't really created something great. He never had. Artists' works inspired _feeling_ in the viewers. All Dean did was put a colourful something onto a boring something else, making it into something pleasing to see. What made his art different from anyone else's? It wasn't talent. It was choosing a good subject matter, it was touching the paper, it was smudging some graphite. It wasn't anything amazing. He just did it. Art, they called it? Dean was no _artist_, and really, it couldn't be simpler than that.

......

When he first met Harry, he wasn't impressed at all. Would anyone be impressed by another scraggy, skinny, silent little kid if you'd just seen him? Oh, he's my age, Dean first thought, but he looks so small.

But wait, because this is HARRY BLOODY POTTER, MATE - WHERE HAVE YOU LIVED THE PAST DECADE, UNDERNEATH A RASTOMARFIN'S EAR??

I'm muggle-born, Dean had said calmly, and Harry had extended his hand from his place besides the loud and livid Ronald Weasley, and said, "I'm Harry Potter, pleased to meet you, we're in the same dorm, right?"

"Dean Thomas," Dean had said, taking the hand. "I've heard of you, but probably not as in depth as your friend there."

Harry grinned. "That's fine. I know even less than you, so no worries."

They got along splendidly.

......

Sometimes, when Dean was sketching absentmindedly, because he was the type that if he wasn't occupied with something, he might as well be drawing, Harry would plop beside him and watch him do it. Harry had had a hard childhood, Dean knew, and didn't have the luxury of taking a pencil and paper and creating something new whenever he pleased. Harry liked watching Dean draw, he'd admitted, it's sort of relaxing, Dean, am I bothering you much? Dean was a bit uncomfortable at first, but he got used to it, because Harry didn't really comment or anything, he just sat and watched, and Dean felt this type of appreciation was better than most.

......

_Hey Harry, can I draw you?_

_Er..._

Dean had been wanting to practice on his shading of the human face because quite frankly, he was abysmal at it. And after drawing Seamus and Ron and Neville, too, when he wasn't looking, it was Harry's turn, though the boy was even more reluctant than Neville was. There were others, of course, but Dean was positive drawing girls would be too troublesome, he wasn't comfortable with other people he didn't know as well, and plus, this was _Harry Potter_.

_No._

_Please?_

_No!_

So when Harry was absorbed in his remedial Potions homework, a hand through his hair and fire light illuminating half his face, Dean took out his sketchbook, and placed his pencil on the page.

Harry was very easy to draw, Dean mused, as thick lines stroked out the contours of his face. Ron was difficult to draw, he was a little jittery about having his portrait done, and Seamus couldn't make up his mind what pose he should be doing even though Dean told him it was just his face being drawn, and once Neville caught Dean sketching him he'd run out of the room, so Dean never finished that one picture properly.

But Harry, sitting still, concentrating and all his features outlined by the orange glow of the fire, it was easy to start, and once he got started, it was easy to go on.

It was a rough sketch, but then, Harry was that sort of person, so Dean thought he'd best not ruin it by making it detailed-as-hell or anything.

He'd tapped Harry on the shoulder once he got most of it finished - and, well, it was a very messy sketch, yet Dean hadn't the heart to clean the lines, so it probably wasn't great. But Harry had actually smiled bashfully and said, "Hah, it actually looks like me! Good job. Now burn it."

Dean grinned.

The piece was exhibited at the art show that year, and even the Slytherins hadn't sabotaged it, on the grounds that it hadn't enough effort put in it for them to put effort into demolishing it, so it was left on its wall, and the Hufflepuff girls fawned over it daily until the art show was taken down.

Once again, Dean was confused. This one sketch had taken all of 45 minutes to do, and yet even all the professors liked it (Professor Snape only because it was proof that Potter was actually doing Potions homework), and the painting he'd spent over forty hours on wasn't nearly praised as much. What the hell?

He'd asked Seamus, who'd said, "It's 'cuz Harry's so hot," and winked at the sketch. (Sketch-Harry was a little mortified.)

He'd asked Neville, who'd said, "Well, you did a very good job on it," but then Dean had done a very good job on all his other artworks, so why was this different? Neville shrugged. "Because it's nice?"

He'd asked Parvati and Lavender, who'd said, "It's 'cuz Harry so hot," and giggled. (Sketch-Harry covered his head with his textbook.)

He'd then asked Ron, and Ron gave him a look that said 'you want ME to explain?', so he'd asked Hermione.

"You know the war's looming, Dean," she'd said very frankly.

"What?" Because that was not an answer he'd been expecting, and it wasn't much of an answer at all.

Hermione sighed.

"There's a war looming," she repeated, "and Harry is going to have to play hero again, and he's going to age much faster than the rest of us, Dean. He's going to be tortured and save people and kill people and die a bit everyday. He'll have to fight and scream and think about whether he'll wake up the next day alive. He's never going to be the same again, and so - your sketch - it just shows Harry, just doing his homework at night, just worrying about whether Snape will give him a passing grade or not... It's... it shows--"

She broke off.

But Dean understood.

They stood silently underneath the framed picture for a long time, watching Harry idly flip the pages in his Potions textbook.

......

After school finished, when he was back home, and his grandmother and mother and father was looking through his portfolio, they'd taken out the sketch of Harry.

"Who's this?"

"Harry Potter," Dean replied, now very fond of that piece, "you've seen him in some photos - he's in my dorm, remember?"

"Oh yes," his mother said, in a sort of flat voice.

"What is it?" Was there something wrong with it? Dean grabbed the paper. It didn't smudge, no rips, what was it, was it no longer moving, yes yes it was, what was wrong with it?

His parents were bewildered. "Dean," his father asked, "granted, it's well done, but why would you sketch a picture of your friend doing homework? This is the one that won first prize in the art show, right? Your letter didn't describe it a lot, we'd just assumed it'd be amazing if it won first place, but we know you're capable of much better than this."

"It's lovely, dear, really," his mother reassured, "but this is hardly the extent of your ability - what made you draw something like this?"

Dean looked at his family, then his picture, and smiled.

"Because I'm an artist."

......

Review. Karma, people, karma.


End file.
